


Down the Rabbit Hole

by mahoni



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-09-22
Updated: 2006-09-22
Packaged: 2017-10-03 06:58:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mahoni/pseuds/mahoni
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>SGA-1 are stuck on the wrong side of a quantum mirror, trying to find the right world to go back to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Down the Rabbit Hole

**Author's Note:**

> There are brief moments of otherdimensional m/m and f/f; also of otherdimensional gender- and species-swap.
> 
> Written for the [](http://community.livejournal.com/summercon/profile)[**summercon**](http://community.livejournal.com/summercon/) _Bad Manips and the stories that love them anyway_ challenge, incorporating manips from [both](http://community.livejournal.com/summercon/2838.html) [posts](http://community.livejournal.com/summercon/2776.html). Many of the graphics in those posts are not work safe. I don't post the graphics I used within my story; I only link out to them. However, before you click the links keep in mind that some of the graphics may not be appropriate for young eyes. Or the eyes of co-workers and bosses.

"I do not think that is our world," Teyla said.

"Is it just me," John said, leaning in for a closer look. "Or do those people look like rejects from Star Trek?"

"You idiot, don't touch it!"

Two hands grabbed the back of his vest and yanked him back.

"I wasn't going to touch it!" John snapped at Rodney, and then glared at Ronon over his shoulder. "You mind putting me down?"

Ronon let go reluctantly as the [emo kid in the blue uniform](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v453/mahoni/bm8.jpg) on the other side of the quantum mirror raised an eyebrow at them. Teyla gasped, and began gesturing urgently.

"Behind you!" she shouted at the mirror.

The world in the other side of the mirror erupted into chaos as bearded aliens in flimsy chain mail body armor attacked. A guy in a red shirt fell almost immediately.

"Big surprise," Rodney muttered, and dialed a new dimension.

The image in the mirror wavered, and cleared.

After a few moments, John observed, "I think you dialed too far in the wrong direction."

"You know," Rodney said. "I could have gone my whole life not knowing what Colonel Caldwell would look like as a [centaur](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v453/mahoni/bm7.jpg), and I would have been perfectly happy."

"I like Dr. Weir's metal bikini top," Ronon said.

Rodney jabbed the remote desperately until the horse people vanished.

"So," John said as they waited for the mirror to settle on another dimension. "Rodney."

Rodney shot him a look. "Don't start. We haven't even been at this an hour yet. I told you it wasn't an exact science. Besides," he muttered. "This is all your fault anyway."

John stared. "_My_ fault? Ronon's the one who touched the damn thing to begin with."

"You're a bad influence on him!"

"_What_ -?"

"I believe a new dimension is beginning to appear," Teyla said loudly.

John scowled at Rodney and folded his arms. "Totally your fault," he said sideways to Ronon.

Ronon shrugged. "You touch stuff all the time."

"Yeah, and have you noticed how well that tends to work out?"

"What _is_ that?" Rodney said suddenly, tilting his head and squinting at the mirror.

They all studied the image, trying to puzzle out the details of what essentially looked like an undulating wall. Then Teyla's eyes widened.

"Does that not look like -"

An arm reached out from the wall and pointed at them. The undulating form resolved into two figures wrapped in a sheet as they stilled and pulled minutely apart.

Ronon broke into a leer. "Yeah, it does."

The women stretched out on the bed, smiling wantonly at their audience while they groped each other.

"They put a _quantum mirror_ on the _ceiling_ above their- "

John interrupted Rodney's rant with a sudden, sharp laugh. "Oh my god! Rodney! The redhead! That's _you_!"

"[It is not!](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v453/mahoni/bm6.jpg)" Rodney said automatically, right before the color drained from his face.

After several pornographic moments, during which John, peering at the scene through his fingers, had doubled over laughing, Ronon murmured, "Damn, Rodney," and Teyla forced out a diplomatic "You make a...very attractive...woman, Rodney."

Rodney moaned despairingly and finally remembered the remote clutched in his hand. He dialed away from the dimension as quickly as his shaking fingers would let him, and squeaked, "If any of you -- tell anyone about this -- oh my god -- I swear I will --"

A new dimension resolved, and suddenly they were looking at a lanky man in very small, tight shorts and odd, wheeled shoes. Their appearance interrupted him mid-preen and he froze, his fingers twined through carefully mussed hair, a canister of something aerosol upraised in his other hand. They all recognized him [immediately](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v453/mahoni/bm5.gif).

Rodney collapsed, shrieking with laughter. John dove at him, trying to pry the remote from him, but he hugged it to his chest, gasping, "No! No! We're obviously getting closer to our universe - because -- _the hair_!"

"Give me that," John growled, planting a foot in Rodney's stomach and pulling at the remote. Rodney finally let go, flopping onto his back, giggling breathlessly.

John pointedly did not look at Ronon or Teyla as he twisted the dial and obliterated the image of his freakish other self. He held the remote tightly, ready to dial away immediately if the new dimension was anything like the last one. A party scene showed up next, though, and he scanned the crowd, relaxing when he didn't see anyone who looked the least bit like himself.

"There," he said calmly. "Now. What have we got here?"

Rodney sat up, wiping his eyes. "Hopefully still the dancing queen universe...?" he wheezed.

Teyla cleared her throat before John could do anything unfortunate, such as shoot Rodney. "It appears to be a festival of some sort," she offered, her voice wavering only a little. When Rodney continued to snorfle and make noises about roller boys and John's expression continued to invoke the God of the Perfect Murder, she kicked Ronon.

He unclenched his knuckles from his teeth and said weakly, "Yes! Festival. Definitely."

Teyla rolled her eyes. "Does that man in white not look familiar?" she said, exasperated.

John was staring fixedly at the mirror, and picked out who she was talking about right away. "Huh. You know, that does kind of look like Dr. Jackson."

Rodney staggered to his feet, still catching his breath. "Where?"

Teyla pointed without touching the mirror. "There. In the center, with the man in the black uniform."

Rodney blinked, squinted, and snickered. "Why yes, yes, that does look like Dr. Daniel Ascended Twice And Everybody Thinks He's God Jackson."

"Well," John said. "At least he's still the right gender."

"How can you tell?" Rodney said gleefully. "He's wearing a [wedding dress](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v453/mahoni/bm4.png)."

"He looks really happy," Ronon said when Teyla kicked him again. "People should be happy on their wedding day."

John stared at him, and he shrugged helplessly.

Rodney sighed, still grinning damply. "Okay. As fun as this is, I'm getting hungry, and I've already eaten all of my power bars, so." He held his hand out for the remote.

John hesitated before handing it over. "If you dial backwards," he began.

"Oh, come on," Rodney said. "You're not the only one who doesn't want to risk revisiting some of those worlds." But he grinned deviously as he flipped the dial, just to watch John flinch.

The mirror flickered through a series of nondescript, unpopulated dimensions, none of which resembled the planet they'd come from. Finally they landed on one that looked promising.

"Ah," Rodney said. "Grass, sun, trees."

"I'm liking this one," John said hopefully.

And then a little girl ran into view. She wore a pink dress and had flowers in her hair, and when she saw them she stopped and stared. After a long moment she smiled, and began to skip toward them.

"Uh oh," John said.

He moved to wave her away, but suddenly she was airborne, scooped up into the arms of a tall, strong man. He had a [doll in one hand](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v453/mahoni/bm3.jpg), and he cuddled the little girl close to him as he gazed, bewildered, into the mirror. The two of them were a study in opposites: he was solid and towering, his face hard angles and planes, his dark dreads pulled into a neat bundle at the back of his head. She was tiny and willowy, her face wide and smooth, her sun-honeyed hair escaping its braids in wild, fly-away wisps. But she watched them with his eyes, and he held her like she had always fit just right in his arms.

"Ronon --" Teyla trailed off softly.

John caught the hand Ronon had reached out, and drew him gently back.

"She looks like her mother."

The words came out broken and unwanted, and because they knew Ronon would take them back if he could, no one said anything. Instead, John nudged Rodney; Rodney turned his eyes reluctantly from the silent, perfect scene, and dialed.

The next image was grass and sunshine again, but also Wraith and humans.

"I don't recognize them," Rodney said, still quiet.

"Nor do I," Teyla said.

In the midst of the melee, a [tall boy](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v453/mahoni/bm2.jpg), shaggy-haired and dressed in the leather and homespun Athosian style, went down at the hands of a Wraith. It raised a hand to feed, and then arched in pain as its chest erupted in a spray of black blood. The boy shoved the dying Wraith off and pushed to his feet. Another man ran up to him, carrying a P-90 and wearing a familiar military buzz cut, but dressed in a uniform neither John nor the others had ever seen.

"Closer," he said.

Rodney dialed again.

The disparities grew less and less as they flipped slowly through the dimensions, until suddenly there was Lorne, in the right uniform, showing the right rank, with the right team complement as well as the right CMO hovering just behind them.

"Is this it?" John said.

"It looks right." Rodney glanced at Teyla and Ronon. "See anything wrong?"

Teyla studied the scene. "It looks correct to me."

Ronon shrugged, expressionless.

It wasn't the rock solid confirmation John would have preferred, but it was a near as he figured he was going to get. "Well, then, I guess we go."

He gave Lorne the signal that they were coming through and then held out his hand. "All at once, so nobody gets left behind." The others grasped his arm, and he touched the mirror, and --

Grass, sunshine, Major Lorne looking incredibly, incredibly relieved.

"Sir," Lorne said. "We weren't sure you'd make it back."

"Yeah," John said, squinting around in the glare. "I was beginning to wonder, too."

Ronon pushed past him wordlessly, heading toward the jumper in the distance. Teyla shared a look with John, and then moved to follow.

"Took a while," John continued. "But we finally got it."

"Rodney!" Beckett had wangled his way through the Marines clustered around them and caught Rodney by the arms, looking him up and down. "My god, I was afraid --" He broke off and [pulled Rodney forward](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v453/mahoni/bm1.png) into a kiss.

John watched Rodney flail in Beckett's passionate embrace for a moment, and then scrubbed a hand tiredly down his face. "Or maybe not."

*


End file.
